Ask the Armouries Japanese Armour 

Audio balancing is still something to work on but this is 10x better than the original. Please keep doing this, having experts talk with these stunning visuals is amazing

whyy the hell this channel is so underated????

Fascinating. The aubergine helmet really told a social story.

22:03: In an age of peace, warriors cosplay as vegetables.

Natasha Bennett, the curator of oriental collections at the Royal Armouries in the UK, which houses thousands of iconic oriental Arms and armours from throughout history. Nice to have you on.

This is japanese broad spreading shoulder armour, and this is a fluffy war elephant. Covering all angles.

I went to the armouries in Leeds a few years ago, loved the Japanese section. There’s some beautiful pieces in that collection!

I really enjoyed this a lot. Thanks for sharing!

Came here to learn about Japanese armor, wound up buying a plush armored elephant toy.

I have a feeling, this woman is really enjoying the new Shogun series atm ;)

Very informative video, and the curator’s voice is a pleasure to listen to

Natasha Bennet has a fantastic wealth of knowledge, great video!

Absolutely fantastic video. Please keep them coming!

Absolutely fascinating! Thank you!

Really enjoyed this vid, I found the Royal Armouries channel through Jonathan Ferguson's videos with Forgotten Weapons and Gamespot but I'm starting to work through the channel's own videos and, as a bit of a Japanese history/samurai geek, this was fascinating. More please!

Thanks for the reupload. Much better!

Great informative video! I've visited a samurai exhibinstion at the Netherlands. These armours are pieces of art.

thankyou for the re upload

Thank you !

i like learning about japanese history and their craftsmen. this was a really great vid with wonderful info on their arrnor and the way it was used. thanks so much

The way the comparison between european and japanese blades is phrased, it gives the impression that not only did the japanese think western blades were inferior, but that they were, in fact, inferior in reality ("We all know japanese blades are legendary...") despite the fact that we know this is not the case, but instead they are built differently to emphasize different attributes which were more important to europeans in warfare. I would be interested in knowing specifically why the japanese regarded foreign blades as inferior. Is it because they prized sharpness and-or edge retention in particular? Are there period documents on the subject?

Thank you for your great job

This is great information easy to understand.

An utterly fascinating video. Thank you... Huzzah!! 😊

Excellent presentation!

Recently played Ghost of Tsushima this has been the most comprehensive look at the armor and period, absolutely brilliant, brilliant job to the presenter.

That was fascinating, thank you

Great video, love this sort of thing.

I'm making a scale set of armour so this was fantastic for my research, thank you

Very interesting. That last helmet was like something from a fantasy movie 🙂

So cool thank you

Absolutely fascinating. Even in warfare, i have always enjoyed the Japanese favour towards beauty, even the irony of it being immediately before death.

Very interesting, thank you.

I absolutely need that plush elephant

fascinating !

Great clip

Fascinating 👍🏼

Fascinating,

great channel and content for people interested in history. ❤it

That was interesting thanks

Fantastic video

Interesting information on the armor of the Japanese. I have read several papers and other information on Oda Nobunaga a leading Daimyo from the Japanese Waring Sates Period. Thank you.

This is great! I found this channel from a Gamespot video on Katanas

Fantastically done documentary! It would be great if you could do a follow up om just Onin to Sengoku Jidai developments! Amazing work

9:20 the rabbit figure also meant playfulness on the battlefield. So the figures could also say something about the warriors. Just a little tip for the next people who would wanna know

Anealing to make metal ore workable can be counteracted by hardening as happened for weapons making.

the armor set at 12:54, the helmet used is very close to a European style called the sugar loaf helm.

A great video, their are pictures of Samurai using shields btw, and a bit more the Tachi and Katana would have been nice 👍

The samurai helmet was the inspiration for the Darth Vader helmet

I remember Ian Bottomley served as curator of Japanese arms and armour.

Fab just sublime 😊

Got my old Suzuki GS650 Katana . Might be worth getting going so I can swagger about town like the local Samurai challenging the peasantry to duels. Bump - starting it to make a cowardly retreat from their pitchforks might be embarrassing though.

Coolest armor ever made, hands down, bar none, NOT CLOSE.

I feel very lucky to be one of the 3000 people to see this great video.

of course, there are many tales of the incredible battlefield performance of the big chungus samurai

The stuffed animal elephant was the best part

4:30 are those boxes on their guns to keep the powder dry from rain?

The audio is a little bit low, but still a fascinating video, really interesting.

How a man shall be armed in the 15th century Japan. Coming soon? 🤔

@royalarmouries near the end of the video when talking about the leaf helmet you state the embossing weakens the armour. I agree with you in principle, however this helmet is embossed with straight lines not filagree like french armour, which strengthens the armour usually. Just my opinion but would love to hear a professional response.

Very interesting Video. As a small time youtuber I can relate with Audio Problems :)

@10:20 minor quibble on the subtitles you might fix. The speaker says "Buke" the japanese word for the warrior class, but the subtitler wrote "Bouquet" which is a totally unrelated french word with a roughly identical pronunciation.

Excellent! Is the elephant a reference to the elephant armour?

That ashigaru helmet bears the mon of the Oda clan. The jingasa could double as a cooking pot as well. The wide shoulder guards became smaller in response to the changes in fighting; the sword gradually took over from the Yumi in importance so the shoulder guards correspondingly became smaller.

Imagine dying 1 minute into a battle with a beautiful shiny helmet

There is a very interesting style of faceguard from the 10th or 11th centuries, called the happuri, that looks for all the world like the faceguard of a Greek hoplite's (oplitis οπλίτης) helmet. I don't know if the similarity between the look of the faceguards and the sound of their respective names is just incidental but there are records of hoplite mercenaries interacting with Chinese troops before the 10th century. Just a thought.

cool

problem with these swords is they never reached the molten state so they have impurities. thats why they folded them do much to try to hammer them out.

I'd love to see this lady react to armour and weapons from Ghost of Tsushima.

In a way, the move of armour from a utilitarian towards a symbolic function in Japan parallels somewhat that of Europe (with the allowance that Europe did not experience anything remotely resembling peace). So, the seventeenth century still sees infantry in armour for a time, and armoured cavalry with both traditional and lighter forms of armour simply because they continue fighting, and at least partly continue fighting the same wars that they did in the sixteenth century (Eighty Years War, Turkish Wars, etc.) However, even with this almost continuous military activity (or, perhaps, because of it, the cost involved, alongside other developments), from the eighteenth century onwards, the only piece of armour surviving was the breastplate, used on the battlefield mainly by cuirassiers, and otherwise it is ceremonial - the ornate, parade cuirasses we see in portraits from the era. These are much smaller, less complex, essentially a breastplate (with or without a backplate). The difference is, of course, that in Europe the change is brought about by warfare and practical considerations, whereas in Japan it is the result of policy aimed to curtail warfare.

What about samurai masks , I didn’t hear them mentioned at all

Have you met Jonathan Ferguson? What was he like? Does he like samurai stuff? Say hi to Jonathan if you see him!

I have a samurai armor Do. If I wanted to learn more about its history, how would I go about it?

7:22 Is this from Takeda clan? Cause i saw in the new series and in new episode of Shōgun in ep 3 on Disney+ Edit: Funny how when i turn on my pc, takeda clan logo appears but its also logo for windows 💀

Has there ever been a recorded instance of a samurai battling a medieval european knight?

The simple helmet was very nervous being infront of a camera, it was shivering all the time.

Samurai, you said, means one who serves. The word knight comes directly from the old English, cniht, which means a house servant or, one who serves.

One thing I'd say is that the camera work could be improved when showing individual pieces by taking a little more time to allow the viewer to absorb the detail of the piece rather than skimming over it in a cursory manner. A good example was the failure to show the detail of the gun that Natasha was discussing like the dragon and other embellishments. A simple cut to a separate clip that had the camera stable for a clear shot of the area in question could easily be inserted into the video. Perhaps a storyboard approach would help, following a discussion of what the expert wanted to talk about and highlight.

I'm a little curious as to the rabbit/hare ornamentation on the helmet and what significance it may have held. When I see it the first thought to come to mind is "The wearer went into battle with bunny ears" which is probably not the intent of the armorer or wearer.

I think there was a fair bit of cachet to European armours. Besides being very effective there must have been a point of pride to having "international" connections spanning a whole continent.

My weird question is how the armor withstood attacks from swords. Was the armor capable of deflecting attacks from swords or where they more concerned about arrows. Recently I learned the samurai actually banked their skills on spears and bows and arrows rather than the swords.

Had no idea this collection existed.

Would these items have a value? Or would they be considered priceless?

that's so cool! how'd they get to the U.K. tho

Whats its called, lamellar ?

Maybe Im wrong but didnt samurais wore Odachis instead of katana? Like bigger katana than a casual one.

I do not know if this has been said before, and these guys posted this a year ago so it's a late comment, but in fact, we DO have a lot of evidence of Tate, the common small rectangular Japanese shields being used before the Heian period, more importantly, we have plenty of evidence of their use in the Samurai Era, post Heian. Certainly they were fairly common among infantry of the non-Samurai class, and indeed, even with firearms, we see their use, not maybe typical Tate, but oversized, thicker ones, which bore a strong resemblance to the free standing Pavis of Europe, they'd make walls out of a line of them and shoot over them. However, we also know from both art and textual sources, that from the 13th to the 16th centuries, Tate never even fully disappeared in the Samurai armoury. Whilst the bow became the power weapon of the Samurai, and they became expert mounted archers, and their sword style employed both hands, or less commonly, two swords if not.... they were NOT the only Samurai weapons... and much like Europe, we see polearms being a constant elements to some extent, lesser or greater, in the Samurai arsenal. During the Samurai period, often you either employed a Bow, mounted, or a Sword mounted if you had to, or a Sword on the field afoot.... but for certain Samurai, from certain schools and regions, or serving certain Lords.... polearms, like the Naginata, or certain types of Spear became very popular and were more often used, especially when mounted. Tate were the go to method for addressing this, as often, even the Naginata would be deployed more like a Lance than a Glaive. Much as in Europe, the best way to protect yourself from something powerful enough to breach the tolerances of your armour, was a shield. It just was something not really noted by European historians, or non Japanese who were exposed to the culture at the time, because they were just not as common as they were in Europe, or had been, at least. So actually, it would not be unheard of to see a Samurai riding in to battle with a Tate shield mounted on his back, just like a Europe Knight might.

When gun Jesus meets heavenly Bennet I’m pretty sure William the first western samurai warrior will be looking down on you beaming ear to ear

A tale of two Island Countries .... Japan, having established political stability by the early 1600s turned inward....Britain, despite the political issues of succession, religion and subsequent Civil War, looked outward and expanded well past their shores. Imagine if Japan had a more flexible foreign policy with Diplomats and Trade missions in Europe, Czarist Russia and Colonial North and South America.....then realized the advantages of state-sponsored industrialization a century earlier than the Meiji Restoration. We would be living in a very different World today.

You should rate the armours in video games

Why is japanese armour so often black? is it paint? or is it from a heat treatment for the iron? how did you maintain it and avoid rust?

Not in a disrespectful way, but hopefully I'll be able to purchase a real one by this Halloween

So, answering the question about samurai being similar to European knights regarding social status: Yes.

😮❤🎉

I gotta get an eggplant helmet!

What's with the elephant?

I want an eggplant armor set, i am sure this will make everyone jelous

So sometime ago in japan a dude ran around as an eggplant. Humanity is remarkable.

I really want to buy a samurai armor set but I’m afraid the Japanese will hate me for it. I’m not trying to appropriate their culture I adore their culture and want to immerse myself in it. Would like to hear you guy’s opinion on this matter.

Lets fighting love!